Typically, a user (e.g., a taxpayer) may use a tax return preparation application to prepare a tax return for electronic filing with a taxing authority. Instead of manually completing a tax return form (e.g., by pen and paper), the user may answer a series of questions presented by the tax return preparation application. The tax return preparation application may use the answers provided by the user to prepare the tax return. Once prepared, the tax return may be sent to an electronic filing system for electronically filing with a taxing authority. Electronically filing a tax return prepared by a tax return preparation application may result in less filing errors than a tax return that is prepared by manually completing a tax return form and mailing the form to the taxing authority. Furthermore, a taxing authority may provide tax refunds in a timelier manner when a user files a tax return electronically.
Alternatively, a user may prepare and file a tax return by manually completing a tax return form issued by a taxing authority (e.g., Form 1040 issued by the Internal Revenue Service) and mailing the tax return form along with any necessary supporting documents (e.g., Form W-2) to the taxing authority. For example, the user may manually complete a hardcopy version of the tax return form by writing the necessary tax return information into the appropriate fields of the hardcopy tax return form and mailing the form along with any necessary supporting documents to a taxing authority. If any errors are present within the tax return form or supporting documents, the taxing authority may notify the user of the errors at a later date. If a tax refund is due, the refund is typically mailed to an address or electronically deposited to a bank account designated by the user. Additionally, the presence of errors within the tax return form or supporting documents delays the processing of any tax refund due.
Instead of manually completing a hardcopy version of the tax return form (e.g., by writing in the necessary information), the user may complete an electronic version of the tax return form of a standard document presentation format such as Portable Document Format (PDF), Microsoft Word document format, StarOffice document format, or any other format of an application providing standard document viewing and/or editing capabilities such as an image file format or word processing file format. To complete an electronic version of the tax return, the user may enter (e.g., type) the necessary tax return information into the appropriate fields. For example, the user may enter tax return information into the appropriate fields of a PDF tax return form and subsequently save the file. Alternatively, the user may use a tax form preparation application to complete the electronic version of the tax return form. For example, the tax form preparation application may prompt the user with a series of question related to various tax items. Subsequently, the tax form preparation application may create a completed electronic version of the tax return form in a standard document presentation format. For instance, the tax form preparation application may create a completed tax return form in PDF or Microsoft Word document format. A standard document presentation format is a format in which a document in that format can be displayed and/or edited as a document by a standard word processing or display application, such as Microsoft Word® or Adobe Acrobat®.
While creating the tax return form in a standard document presentation format may be more convenient than hand writing the form, the user may nevertheless be required to print a hardcopy of the tax return and mail the tax return (along with any supporting documents) to the taxing authority in order to complete the filing of the tax return. In other words, the filing of a tax return including a tax return form of a standard document presentation format may be no different than the filing of a tax return including a written hardcopy tax return form as described above. Existing electronic filing solutions do not and cannot electronically file tax returns to a taxing authority in a standard document presentation format. Since an electronic filing system and/or taxing authority may not be capable of processing tax returns including documents of a standard document presentation format, users choosing to prepare their tax returns in this manner may not be able to realize the benefits associated with electronic filing.